Bulgaria exhib programs 3-D

Imax' 'Mania,' 'Haunted' to christen venue

Bulgaria’s exhibition industry has gone three-dimensional after the grand opening this month of the Moskva 3D Cinema in Sofia.

Owned by state exhib Sofia Film, the 250-seater Moskva 3D launched with the bow of the Imax films “3D Mania: Encounter in the Third Dimension” and “Haunted Castle.”

Interest in the new cinema appears high, as Bulgaria has a tradition in 3-D exhibition. Twenty years ago, Sofia’s communist-controlled exhibitor opened a Soviet-made 3-D cinema that was wildly popular but eventually closed because of a lack of titles to screen.

“People like 3-D, but that old cinema played the same three or four films over and over again, and eventually business became lower and lower,” said a Sofia moviegoer who visited the cinema as a child. “You can only see the same movie so many times.”